'Soc. I may affirm also that the breathless calm and stillness and the like are wasting and impairing, and wind and storm preserving; and the palmary argument of all, which I strongly urge, is the golden chain in Homer, by which he means the Sun, thus indicating that while the sun and the heavens go round, all things divine and human are, and are preserved; but if the sun were to be arrested in his course, then all things would be destroyed, and, as the saying is, Chaos would come again.'-Plato, Theatetus. Jowett's trans. respondence with the development of nerve-functions into all the phases of conscious life. § 12. This view is quite in accord with what we have learned in our study with regard to unconsciousness in its bearings on consciousness. There is undeniably in conscious life an activity working all the time underneath consciousness whose results are continually being brought into consciousness, and by all the laws of consciousness we are forced to postulate a subject-mind below all conscious manifestations. This we are obliged by like warrant to exclude from and put over against a subject Non-Ego. Moreover, consciousness is evidently a growth from the simple, the indefinite, and homogeneous. Indistinct consciousness arose before distinct consciousness. The argument then is, that below consciousness there is mind-substance, still opposed to Non-Ego substance, but still somehow related to it, out of which all varieties of mind are evolved. § 13. The doctrine here advanced was put forward among other considerations not necessarily involved in it at all by the late William Kingdon Clifford in an article On the Nature of Thingsin-themselves' (Mind, No. IX). Though I cannot subscribe to everything he presents in that article, it seems to me that this author has stated a doctrine with respect to unconscious mind which is supported by psychological science, and that the cogency of his remarks on that point has not been impaired by any of the many criticisms which that paper elicited. But the reality of the Non-Ego world is just as necessary as that of the Ego, and we perceive in the world about us not mind-stuff but matter-stuff, and it is impossible to destroy one without destroying the other. I fail to see that Clifford has succeeded in showing the contrary. § 14. But though we are compelled to postulate a mindsubstance everywhere existing in correspondence or correlation with material substance, our only knowledge of it is through our knowledge of material substance. We have no knowledge of anything save our own consciousness, except mediately through material-substance. We have no knowledge of the existence of other consciousness than our own except inferentially through the material world. I know my own states; I distinguish myself from the things about me; I infer from the Non-Ego the existence of other beings like myself endowed with consciousness; I infer, also, the past history of my consciousness, its growth, its antecedents. I is there dissolution and disintegration which is not in furtherance of, but in opposition to, evolution? The answer and the explanation will be given in the following chapters. CHAPTER LXXIII. INTERRUPTED OR SUSPENDED CONSCIOUSNESS. § 1. CONSCIOUSNESS in a living organism sustains normal interruptions or suspensions at periodic intervals, and may abnormally sustain such interruptions even for long periods. Sleep is the characteristic normal suspension, and swooning, anæsthesia and coma are abnormal. § 2. So far as there is consciousness in sleep, we have already considered the subject in the chapter on Abnormal Development (Chap. XLVII.), but we did not there pay much attention to the state of sleep itself. This is a biological state, promoting the nutrition of the organs by a decrease of the vital activity and processes of oxidation that go on within the organism. It is characterised by muscular relaxation, obtusion of the senses, diminution of the respiratory movements, decrease in the number of heart beats, lowering of the bodily temperature, and a state of insensibility to pain in direct proportion to the intensity of the sleep. The functional activity of the brain, both in the reception of impressions, their co-ordination, and in efferent transmission, is very greatly lowered. This occurs by reason of the diminished supply of blood sent to the brain. 'In the experimental inquiries of A. Durham, made by removing (under chloroform) a portion of the skull of a dog, so as to expose the cortical layer of the cerebrum, it was observed that as the effects of the chloroform passed off and the animal sank into a natural sleep, the surface of the brain, which had previously been turgid with blood and inclined to rise into the opening through the bone, became pale and sank below the level. On the animal being roused after a time, a blush seemed to start over the surface of the brain, which again rose into the opening through the bone. And as the animal was more and more excited, the brain surface became more and more expressed to us in material phenomena, and these are the only indicia of mind substance; while on the other hand, in conscious states, the material phenomena corresponding are suppressed, and are only expressed in conscious phenomena. In the former case we are thus led to affirm the physical states as causing the mental, and in the latter case the corresponding suppression compels us to assert that the mental states produce the subsequent effects manifest in material phenomena. It is this curious suppression of the mental in the one case, and of the material in the other, that has undoubtedly led to much misunderstanding as to the relations of mind and matter. But it would be awkward certainly, and probably hopeless, to undertake a reform in this connection. And it being once clearly understood that such a statement of cause and effect is only an abridged statement of the facts, there need not be any further confusion. For working purposes the statement is sufficient; for scientific, it is readily susceptible of explanation; possibly it may turn out to be exactly true, after all. § 18. I shall not occupy myself nor my readers with any of the thousand and one philosophical and speculative questions which these considerations upon the connection of mind and body suggest. Whole philosophies could readily be evoked from them. With such we have nothing to do. If we have succeeded in our professed endeavour to exhibit the science of states of consciousness, the things we know with reasonable certainty about conscious states and their relations, we have indeed laid a foundation for philosophers to work upon; but to them we will leave the field of labour.1 If any critic of this work desires a complete and searching review made of its faults, I can assure him that he will do well to apply to me, for I am certain of more shortcomings than any one who has not made the subject an especial study can possibly observe. I send the book forth very reluctantly, but in the hope that possibly it may aid a little in unifying and systematising psychological knowledge. At least its writing will have proved a benefit to myself in making clearer and more settled my own beliefs. If any reader thinks it worth his while, I shall be greatly obliged if he will send me word of any imperfections he may notice, so that may have the advantage of such suggestions in case a second edition should seem advisable. THE END. |